This Pulitzer prize winning book (1989) by Rhodes is an expansive overview of the birth and growth of nuclear physics that climaxes in the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is divided into three parts: the rise of nuclear physics from 1895 to 1939, wartime work on the atomic bomb in the U.S. and Germany, and the three detonations (the Trinity test and the bombings in Japan). The author’s compelling account, emphasizing the actions of remarkable characters and the impacts of world-shaking events, makes this one of the outstanding books on the bomb. An epilogue continues the story into the 1950s and provides a link to the author’s sequels, Dark Sun: the Making of the Hydrogen Bomb, Arsenals of Folly: The Making of the Nuclear Arma Race, and The Twilight of the Bombs: Recent Challenges, New Dangers, and the Prospect for a World Without Nuclear Weapons. The extensive bibliography reflects his attention to detail.